Pennywise and I go way back. Alongside Freddy Krueger, Pennywise traumatised me in my nightmares and left me with a lifelong fear of clowns.

I was first introduced to ‘It’ on holiday in Florida with my parents and brother.

This would have been in 1990, when ‘It’ was first shown on television in the US. I was seven, seven years old and watching a horror film about a psychotic clown feeding off the fears of children.

At least I have some explanation as to why my mind is so wonderfully messed up.

For anyone who doesn’t know, Pennywise is a dancing clown who lurks in the sewers of a fictional town called Derry. He entices children in to his lair with promises of floating balloons, then he eats them!

I love this film, I call it a film but it was actually a two part TV movie but that’s not important. I made all my friends watch it when we were younger, I may well have been the cause of some sleepless nights… oops.

If you were to watch the original now for the first time it may seem quite dated and that’s okay but the premise is still terrifying, which I suppose is the reason some awesome people decided to remake it in to a proper film.

I first heard about the remake a fair few years ago and my friend Hayley and I have been waiting patiently for it to manifest.

I am no longer a fan of scary films, they give me nightmares, and the only scary films I’ve seen at the cinema were ‘Scream 3’ and ‘The Blair Witch Project’ so I was slightly nervous about ‘It’ but there was no way I was going to miss this.

We made sure we were on the back row and to the side of the cinema so that way nobody could kill us. I nestled myself between Hayley and my Mum and had my scarf on hand to hide behind.

The years of trepidation and excitement were well worth it. I jumped out of my skin, I screamed like a big girl and I was most grateful for having my Mummy right there next to me. Obviously special effects are way more advanced than they were back in the 90’s  but aside from that the film stayed true to the story, more so than the original in some ways. It was an excellent introduction to some new young talent; Sophia Lillis, who was just captivating and Finn Wolfhard (who some may recognise from Stranger Things, 2016) was hilarious, yes hilarious. The original TV movie did have the odd chuckle, thanks to Seth Green but this time round it lured you in to a false sense of security, with laughter and guffaws, then slammed you straight back in to terrified with Pennywise and his horrendously creepy face.

This clown is the greatest fear inducing, maniacal tormentor that has ever graced our movie theatres, I hate him but I also kind of love him…move over Tim Curry and Robert Englund, Bill Skarsgard is the new man of my nightmares…

Be happy and keeps smiling, like a clown.